WASHINGTON: US stock futures ticked higher on Wednesday as investors parsed through the latest batch of corporate earnings and the US Treasury secretary said failure to overhaul the American tax system could undo Wall Street’s record setting rally.
With less than an hour to go before the market opens, futures for the S&P 500 were up 0.2 per cent while those for the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the Nasdaq 100 rose 0.4 and 0.1 per cent respectively. The moves come as Steven Mnuchin warned US stocks could reverse a “significant amount” of their recent gains if Congress does not push through tax reforms. Elsewhere, fresh talks that the next chair of the US Federal Reserve could be a policy hawk prompted a modest sell-off in Treasuries, pushing yields higher. The yield on the 10-year paper rose 4.3 basis points to 2.3393 per cent amid speculation that Stanford economist John Taylor – who is seen to be more aggressive about raising interest rates – could be the frontrunner for the role. The talks also helped push the dollar higher, with the DXY index up 0.1 per cent at 93.58. Gold – which offers no yield and tends to come under pressure when interest rate rises – fell 0.4 per cent to $1,280 per troy ounce.
